At the American Sewing Expo a couple weeks ago I was surrounded by all kinds of inspiration, gorgeous fabrics and trims, and fashion everywhere. I really wanted to make something new for myself and it struck me that I could really use a flattering easy to wear, easy to travel with black dress. It's such a cliche, but cliches become cliches for a reason.

I was sitting at the Simplicity booth and asked Deborah Kreiling for a pattern recommendation. And she handed me this one. It is brand new and should be available any day now. A princess line is easy to fit and I liked the raglan sleeves. I wanted the 3/4 length sleeves but not the lace overlay about the middle. So, now I just had to find the perfect black fabric.

There were several excellent fabric stores with booths at the show. The first one I visited had a fabric that might work. I wanted to show it to the Deborah at the Simplicity booth (just 3 booths away), but they would only give me the teeny tiniest swatch ... grrr. But, Deborah could tell, at least, that it had a kind of diagonal gaberdine weave to it. She said that could give a really strange effect on a dress with princess seams running from top to bottom. So, I looked some more and found a really nice feeling double knit. Now this booth had a half yard remnant under the cutting table they let me take to show Deborah. She said it would work fine, even though the pattern calls for a woven fabric, not a knit.

Back to the fabric booth the buy necessary yardage. That's Rogie one of the owners of Vogue Fabrics in Illinois. And, I'm not sure who the very happy looking guy is between us. But, you can see this was a fun show.

Now that I've worked with this fabric, I want you all to know about it. It's great to sew and even better to wear. I want to try one of those dresses with color breaks in them using 2 or 3 colors of this stuff. The polyester and spandex make it a practical fabric and the 30% Rayon makes it feel like a real fiber, not plastic. Hmmm, maybe a jacket for travel.